On Subjects, Objects, Transitional Fields, and Icons: The Semiotics of a New Paradigm in Human Studies

To save what is human (and humane) about the human sciences, the subject/object dyad must be abandoned in favour of a semiotic and an anthropological point of view. This viewpoint draws on the interaction of several signifiers in dialogue with a salient space similar in nature to the transitional field of psychoanalysis and—via an interpretation of that space—to the iconic function of human culture as seen by patristic wisdom. To attain this viewpoint entails abandoning the idea that the human sciences are supposed to explain the human being. Their task is to clarify the plural and ecological character of humans.